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Show j AFTER "KING DAVID," Hl "Evanston, Wyoming1, January 31st, 1911. H "Editor Standard: In the Salt Lake Tribune of today appears, H nnder the head of 'Special to the Tribune,' an articlo from Ogttcn on H the sugar beet question, in which appears the following-: 'Tho H Sugar King (Ecclcs) says that the low price of sugar will not war- H rant an increase of one cent more in the price of beets, this year.' H i I While in this locality we are not specially interested in sugar beets, H wc are decidedly interested in tho price of sugar. I have been living H f in Ogdcn for the past two years, and do not know of any town in the H Western country where that commodity is as high to the consumer as H ' right there. I believe the present retail price is about 14 pounds for f a dollar. In Denver 18 pounds is the common quotation; Fort Col- M lins and Greeley, 16 pounds. When Eccles speaks of the LOW H PRICE of sugar, he must surely be joking. It is easily within the H memory of any of us when sugar sold at 20 pounds for a dollar. At H the present time, one has to go five or six hundred miles from home H ' to buy the home-made article at a reasonable price. Why is this, and H why do we stand for it? Sincerely, (Signed) WILLIAM M. STAHL." H Mr. Stahl must not forget that Mr. Eccles and his Sugar com- H panies job their sugar at a certain price, and that Mr. Eccles is not H J responsible for the retail price. For instance, Utah docs not furnish H ' market for one-fourth of the sugar manufactured in Utah, hence H the Ogden sugar factory wholesales the sugar in Ogden just as cheap- H ly as the Hawaiian sugar trust or the American sugar trust can lay H ' 't down in Ogden. The surplus sugar, which is three-fourths of tho H vhole supply in Utah, Mr. Eccles must send East and he must pay H ihe freight and sell it as cheaply as the sugar trust docs. We do H lot believe Mr. Eccles makes much on his sugar shipped East when j le pays the freight and sells the sugar in Chicago at $4.90 per hun- H lred pounds. Chicago is as far east as the Ogden Sugar company M ian ship and come out whole. Therefore, if the Chicago market nets M he Ogden Sugar company 10 cents per hundred pounds, or even H five cents, it is a safe market in which to dump all the sugar that can H lot be sold nearer home. Utah, and a line north and south through Hj Jtah, marks the highest freight rate in the Uuited States, and H laturally Utah will have the highest price on such staples as sugar. H The fact that the Spreckels sugar refineries of California do not un- H lersell the Ogden factory is proof that the Eccles companies are not H unreasonable in their wholesale prices, compared with other sugar H prices. H Years ago the grocer did not try to make any profit on sugar, H but it is different in Ogden now. I H Of course, we wish "King David" would get one of his gener- H ous impulses and cut the price of sugar to the Chicago price. That . would give 20 pounds for $1.00, but that is hopeless because the sugar factory was not built for philanthropic purposes. Mr. Ecclcs may bo entitled to a scorching on general principles, but one industry of lijs against whioh tho people of Ogden cannot, in all fairness, icOmplain is tho sugar industry, as millions of dollars come into this community from that source. If there is any complaint to be made, it should be directed at the larger sugar interests which force certain conditions, not alono upon Mr. Eccles and his associates,, associ-ates,, butupon, all owners of beet sugar plants. Wc are informe'd the factory price of sugar Thursday morning in Ogdcn was $4.90. The first of the week the price here was $5.05. Not since tho Ogdcn factory oponed, nearly fourteen years ago, has sugar sold at tho factory at a price so low. Now, who is to blame? If the grocers of Ogden have sold 20 pounds of sugar for $1 in tho past, there is no good reason why they should not now be soiling 20 pounds for $1, as they are getting their sugar today at a smallor figure than at any time in the history of the sugar trade. |